What makes a light bulb work ?

An ordinary light bulb like Edison made has electricity going through a fine coiled wire so it gets very hot - white hot. It doesn't burn up because inside the globe is a vacuum without oxygen needed for burning. What Edison did most accurately was test hundreds of materials and mountings to see what would survive for more than a few minutes. Other people were working on other aspects of bulbs at the same time, so it is sometimes claimed that Edison did not invent the light bulb or that he stole the ideas.

High resistance tungsten wire (filament) is cooked by current passing through it. It turns into bright red hot and emitting light. You may copy some information for your over due home work from this link........ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incandescent_light_bulb

An ordinary light bulb like Edison made has electricity going through a fine coiled wire so it gets very hot - white hot. It doesn't burn up because inside the globe is a vacuum without oxygen needed for burning. What Edison did most accurately was test hundreds of materials and mountings to see what would survive for more than a few minutes. Other people were working on other aspects of bulbs at the same time, so it is sometimes claimed that Edison did not invent the light bulb or that he stole the ideas.